Sport management draws in sponsorship

Proper management in South African sport is directly linked to attracting sponsorship.

“We need to get better management in sports. If you look at South Africa, there’s a lot of sports that are bankrupt, there’s a lot of sports that need money, there’s a lot of sports that are mismanaged. Athletics South Africa – we still can’t go to the Olympic Games until we get our ‘house’ right,” Ray Wicksell Consultancy’s founder and CEO Ray Wicksell told CNBC Africa on Friday.

“You need proper management. You’ve got to get the people that really understand sport – good business executives and then you’ll strive. It’s scary for sponsors to see interruption in sport because when you see that, you think do I really want to put my money into that particular sport.”

This comes after South African financier Absa announced that it would be ending its sponsorship of the country’s national soccer team, Bafana Bafana.

“I think they want to restructure their goals, they might want to look into customer service, they might look into getting people to bank more with Absa. It’s very sad because we need big bucks in sport in South Africa,” Wicksell indicated.

“They’re still in the PSL, they’re still with the Springboks – they’ve put in years and years of money into sport in this country. We need lots of money to develop our youngsters, especially with the Olympic Games coming up in 2016.”

Wicksell added that the teams should be getting involved with those that sponsor them, and that he hasn’t seen much of that in South Africa.

“I think sponsorships should use the players more so and get them active in really developing the brand – that’s lacking in South Africa,” he said.

“Being involved with Nike, we look into long-term relationships. We get involved with sponsorships for 10, 15, 20 years and we leverage those sponsorships. To me it’s very sad that they [Absa] pulled out but I could see their thinking and where they probably want to head in customer service and getting more people to bank with Absa.”